CHAP. ii. The Mahseer' s first rush. 9 



point of view it is that I say a Mahseer shows more sport than a salmon. 

 Not that you can kill more of them, which you may also do, but that 

 each individual Mahseer makes a better fight than a salmon of the same 

 size. I am prepared to expect that on this point, as on most others not 

 capable of being proved to demonstration, and perhaps in not a few of 

 these last also, some will disagree with me. Quot homines, tot sententia. 

 For my own part I can only say that my prejudices were all in favour 

 of the salmon, both as being a salmon, a sort of lion of the waters, 

 whom I had grown up looking on with respect from my childhood, 

 and as being a fellow-countryman. But the Mahseer compelled 

 me to believe in and honour him in spite of my pre judgment to the 

 contrary. 



The M ah seer's First Rush. I came to the conclusion that 

 though he might not make so long a fight of it as a salmon, he yet made 

 a much more difficult one, because his attack was more impetuously 

 vehement, his first rush more violent, all his energies being concentrated 

 in making it effective, though his efforts were not, and from that very 

 cause, could not be, so long sustained. Trying to account for this I 

 had the curiosity to measure and compare the size of his tail and fins 

 with that of his body, and I found that the superficial area of his 

 propelling and directing power amounted together to as much as the 

 superficial area of the whole of the rest of his body. The proportion 

 which the tail and fins of a salmon bear to the rest of his body is very 

 much smaller. The Mahseer having then so much greater means of 

 putting on steam, and having also the habit of always putting it on at 

 once energetically and unsparingly, it is readily intelligible that his first 

 rush is a mighty one, and that, that made, his strength is comparatively 

 soon exhausted. Other rushes he will make, but his first is the 

 dangerous one. Then it is that the final issue of the campaign is 

 practically decided. Be one too many for him then, and you may be 

 grimly satisfied that all else he can do will not avail him; you may 

 count on making him your own. Then it is that you must wait upon 

 him diligently. If you have not got all free, the connection between 

 you and your new friend will be severed within a moment of your 

 making each other's acquaintance. If you have carelessly allowed the 

 line to get a turn round the tip of the rod, or let any slack near the 

 hand become kinked ever so little, or twiste'd over the butt, or hitched 

 in the reel or a button, then it is that not a moment's law is given you 



